On the Ending of Twin Peaks The Return: "How Do You Say Goodbye to Art That Never Leaves You?"

Many people feel this about Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Game of Thrones, and Star Wars. These are grand works of art that combine dramatic storytelling with swashbuckling adventure, fueled by mind-blowing cinematography and special effects. Twin Peaks only has two of those four elements and, after watching The Return, I would argue that it pierces deeper than any of those mega-series. Hardly swashbuckling, Dale Cooper as Dougie Jones, our protagonist hero, remains completely silent over four-fifths of his on screen time and his arch-nemesis doesn’t speak much more than that either. The war in Twin Peaks is a quiet one but is also the most dangerous conflict the human species has ever engaged in, because it is a war for our souls. This war is much like the one we fight together, separately every day, foolishly believing we are alone, swinging our swords in the darkness, when in reality we whiff the quiet dark together with our blades and if we were to swing in unison against the common enemy?

Well things would change in a instant, wouldn’t they?

This insight is the legacy of Twin Peaks The Return. We watched the goodness of simplicity and silence broil into a liquid gold benevolence that poured from our silent hero, Dale Cooper, into the hearts and minds and spirits of those around him, while his arch-nemesis doppleganger, in quest for the deep black, created empty thought forms, filled them with deadly poison, set them in place on the board of life, and yet still watched them fall to the gold.

In Oliver Stone’s film Nixon, there is a point where E. Howard Hunt tells John Dean, “Nixon is the darkness reaching out for the darkness and eventually it’s either you or him.” No truer thing could be said of Dale Cooper’s evil double, Mr C. While on the other side of the mirror, Dougie Cooper carries the simple goodness of a baby Buddha, frustrating, foiling and foaming his spiritual light all over their lives, turning their screaming mouths into soft smiles.

This is a show for poet warriors of light who seek to illuminate the darkness and walk away from pain.